Thursday, January 20, 2011

Gordon in the morning: The great game

There's a scandalously bad piece of writing leading Gordon's column this morning:

Cops held Alex in dawn coke raid
Gordon himself hasn't helped write this story:
By JAMIE PYATT, CAROLINE McGUIRE, STUART PINK and RICHARD WHITE
Perhaps there was no room for Gordon in front of the computer. Still, it has appeared on his pages.

You'll spot something odd, though - a tabloid gossip headline written in the past tense.

It turns out this "dawn coke raid" took place in 2006 and Reid was held, but, as the story grudgingly admits way, way into the story:
He admitted he knew two of the drug gang, who had links to cage fighting, but said he'd only suggested opening a boat business with them. Cops accepted this.
Is it really fair to report a five year-old arrest in splashy headlines but only mention much, much further on that, actually, nothing came of it?

On that basis, this headline:
Sun executive held overnight after assault arrest
would be equally valid, but Rebekah Brooks was also released without charge, after a police investigation in the middle of the last decade, and so that would feel a little manipulative.

Elsewhere, it looks like Robbie Williams shouldn't be getting too comfy: Gary Barlow thinks the future of Take That is as a four piece.

I assume he means without Robbie, but I guess he could be thinking "at last, I can be rid of Donald".


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